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Book Eleven
ccuTocp 67T6iTa CTOKOS ... (3.335, 16.136, 19.373). As Shipp remarks {Studies
278), the dropping of dpyuporjAov in favour of the gold studs has resulted
in the shield verse (32) being completely recast. dopTripecrcnv: not the
baldric itself (TEAOCUCOV) but, according to Hsch., oi KpiKoi TX\% Of)Kr|S, tne
metal rings by which the scabbard was clipped to the leather.
29, 34, 39 oi: the use of I, ou, oi with reference to things is unusual, but
cf. 1.236, 9.419, 21.586, 24.452.
32-9 The shield of Agamemnon. There is a discussion by H. Borchhardt
in Arch. Horn, E 50-6 with a line-drawing of the Gorgon-shield from
Carchemish first published by C. L. Woolley, Carchemish 11 (London 1921)
pi. 24. In conception Agamemnon's shield is similar to the aegis of Athene
at 5.738-42, cuyiScc ... SEIVTJV, r\v Trepi [xsv Travrn 9o(3os £OT69dvcoT0cr |
EV 8' "Epis, ev 6* 'AAKT), S£ 8s Kpuoeaaa 'ICOKT), | ev 8e T8 ropyern K69aAr]
SeivoTo TTEAcopou, I 8eivr| T6 CT|i6p8vr| T£, Aids Tepas cayioxoio. The shield
of Herakles was even more horrific, Aspis 144-67. This aspect probably
reflects the latest models known to the poet and is combined with features
familiar to him from traditional descriptions: tin and KUCCVOS are Mycenaean,
bosses are known from the late Bronze Age, the KUKAOI from Dark Age
practice. It is not clear how, or if, a central boss of KUCCVOS can be combined
with the Gorgon's head, and the verb eore9&vcoTo does not help matters
(see 36-7n). This is the only arming scene in which the shield is denoted by
OCCTTTIS not (JOCKOS; see D. H. F. Gray, CQ4.1 (1947) 113-14, 119-21, and
Whallon, Formula, Character, and Context 36-54, for the usage of these two
terms.
32 dorms, the commoner term in the narrative, 95 x against (JOCKOS 76 X ,
is the vernacular word that replaces CTOCKOS when the formular verse is
abandoned. diJupippoTnv is taken from the formula in the gen. sing. d(77Ti8os
d|i9ippoTr|S (3X //.). The strict sense 'covering a man on both sides' is not
applicable to the round, bossed, shield, and the epic must have taken it in
a generalized way to mean 'protecting the warrior', see the literature cited
in LfrgE s.v. Even so the epithet is giving way to the modernism EUKUKAOS.
If d|i9ippoTT| is an archaism the short 1 before |3p and the implied sense of
PpOTOs = dvrjp raise the possibility that an unintelligible term has been
reinterpreted, cf. Myc. a-pi-qo-to, 'round' (?), PY Ta 642. For -|3p- <
~mr- (cf. TEpvyiuppoTOs) see M. Lejeune, Phonetique historique du mycenien et
dugrec ancien (Paris 1972) 307, and for the view that d^tppOTTj reflects Myc.
amphimrta see Janko vol. iv 11. The metrical effect of r is suspected in
compounds of ppOTOS (dppoTr|, dppoTd^onev < -mrtos), formulas (8eiAoT(ji
PpoToTai), and in compounds of dvrjp (avSpoT^Ta, dv8p6i9OVTT) < anr-, cf.
Myc. a-no-qo-ta KN Da 1289, etc.). 7roAu8ai8ccAov: usually of the corslet
(4X ), only here of the shield, but a fitting anticipation of the following
description. Ooupiv (with donri8a 20.162, aiyiSa 15.308) is unexpected as
220